1984 was meant to be a dark vision of a dystopia
thirty-six years into George Orwell’s future that could result
from the trends he observed in 1948. As such it was meant to as
a warning to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society
they should strive after. Unfortunately, Orwell was less
than perfectly successful, so while the details are different
and less hellish, we are on a path toward Orwell’s
1984 more than we are avoiding it. Our failure to
avoid some of Orwell’s vision is the result of our
over-simplifying his warning, seeing Stalinism as the primary
thing to be avoided. Stalinism was avoided, but nonetheless the
fourth estate today emulates to some
degree 1984’s Ministry of Truth. Big brother exists,
though differently; in 1984 it seems to be an icon
of the government (though this is not explicit) somewhat modeled
after Joseph Stalin, whereas in 2004 big brother exists in our
corporations, who exercise mind control through advertising and
public relations (and which to some degree also control the
government). Some even see U.S. politics as best described as a
one-party system of
Republicrats, with two factions,
rather than as a real multi-party state. Our language has
continues to be 1984ish as well, with
doublespeak,
euphemism, and dysphemism reflected in and emulating
1984’s Newspeak (Orwell
saw this even in 1946). The
three slogans of The Party of 1984 are still
recognizable in modern politics. The War on Terrorism
declared by President Reagan and reinvigorated with the 11
September destruction of the World Trade Center keeps alive the
notion of
perpetual
war and 1984’s slogan War is Peace.
Ignorance is Strength often seems to be the motto of the
modern fourth estate. Freedom is Slavery could well be
the goal of the religious right.

n.
An election procedure where voters may vote for as many of the
candidates as they like. The candidate with the most votes
wins.

Approval Voting is a superior alternative to standard
single-vote plurality (used in most United States elections) for
winner-take-all
elections. It has the advantage of being very simple and about
as good as the best procedures.

n.CURRENT:
Artificially manufactured movement designed to give the
appearance of grass roots.

Astroturf is the creation of the modern
public relations
industry. It is typically used by corporations to create the
appearance of legitimacy for an unpopular position, and thereby
stifle opposition or prevent corrective change.

bicameralism

n.
Dividing a legislature into two separate deliberative
bodies with different characteristics.

Bicameral legislatures make it more difficult to pass
legislation and budgets, but they may guard against
corrupt or unwise decisions that would result from a
single legislative body. The bodies typically differ
in the terms of offices, and sometimes in the method
of selection of their members. For example, in the
United States, the term of office for the House of
Representatives is two years, and the entire chamber
is subject to election at the same time, and a single
member is chosen from approximately equal population
geographic districts. In contrast, the term of office
in the Senate is six years, with only one third of its
members chosen every two years, and there are two
members from each geographic region (the States) with
some Senators representing as much as sixty-eight
times as many people as others.

n.ORIGINAL:
One who tends to maintain existing views, conditions, or
institutions.

n.CURRENT:
One who advocates a radical agenda of change, including
demands of conformance to a narrow set of conventions
(e.g. social, economic) prescribed by self-appointed spokesmen.

The meaning of conservative has shifted over time. An old-style
conservative was one who is skeptical of change,
and who prefers a “go slow” approach to change.
The original meaning of “conservative”
had meaning independent of the
political spectrum, but is now
simply used – incorrectly in my opinion – as to mean
someone from the right, i.e. one of the two
dominant parties of the two-party system. The
modern meaning of “conservative” has therefore become
simply a synonym for a Republican, i.e.
an artificial packaging of political views created to help
perpetrate the two party system.
As such, “conservative” has undergone an about-face
to one who demands change from current forms or ways, which are
perceived as deeply flawed, toward a set of restrictive social
mores coupled with a laissez-faire economic program designed to
strengthen the current class system and maintain the power of
the existing ruling classes.

corporate rights

n.
The legal rights created by U.S. courts for corporations

The U.S. constitution (including its amendments) has
no provision for corporations, and does not define
their rights. When corporations began to be parties
in litigation in Federal courts, the courts began to
define the rights of corporations, sometimes (but not
always) considering the term person in the
Constitution to apply to corporations. During the
course of U.S. history, this process has created many
corporate rights, often without any act of Congress.

Corporate welfare takes many forms, including cash transfers,
tax breaks, loans, guarantees, etc. Estimates vary, but
most place corporate welfare at many times the size of
welfare. Despite its confusing name,
corporate welfare is generally not needs based, but rather is
determined by the political clout of the recipients.

n.
One of the two dominant political parties of the United States
dedicated to serving its investors by being in power. It
affects an ideology so as to attract the votes of a small
portion of the electorate. Unrelated to the word
“democracy”.
The mascot
of Democrats is the donkey.

In medieval times the three estates were the clergy, nobility,
and commons. (Later, this notion adapted to more modern
political governance to represent the executive, legislative,
and judicial branches of government.) The term “fourth
estate” was coined by the British politician Edmund Burke
(“Burke said there were three Estates in Parliament, but
in the Reporters Gallery yonder, there sat a fourth estate more
important far than they all.” — Thomas Carlyle) to
indicate the importance of the role the press had come to play
in society. From this role come rights and responsibilities
(the rights recognized for example in the first amendment). The
U.S. press however has begun to forsake its responsibilities,
and now its role is increasingly split between entertainment,
distraction, and propaganda (as in Orwell’s Ministry of Truth).
Indeed, much of the U.S. press has transformed from monitors
of power to stenographers to power.

n.
The basic level of society or of an organization especially as
viewed from higher or more centralized positions of power.

Grass roots movements usually spring from individuals without
political aspiration, but who are so concerned about a
particular issue that they feel compelled to organize
like-minded people. As such they are generally the purest
purposes found in politics. The success of grass roots
movements has led to the creation of its antithesis:
“astroturf”.

GOP

abbreviation.Grand Old Party
A moniker of the Republican Party.
In recent years, a more appropriate moniker is
KOP.

green party

Greens are a world-wide movement based on

Ecological Wisdom

Grassroots Democracy

Personal and Social Responsibility

Non-violence

Decentralization

Community-based Economics

Postpatriarchal Values

Respect for Diversity

Global Responsibility

Future Focus and Sustainability

There are individual Green Parties in various nations, including
the United States.

But the annual revenue of every society is always precisely
equal to the exchangeable value of the whole annual produce of
its industry, or rather is precisely the same thing with that
exchangeable value. As every individual, therefore, endeavours
as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of
domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its
produce may be of the greatest value; every individual
necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society
as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to
promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting
it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign
industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing
that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the
greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this,
as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an
end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the
worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his
own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more
effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have
never known much good done by those who affected to trade for
the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common
among merchants, and very few words need be employed in
dissuading them from it.

The invisible hand has become perhaps the most famous phrase of
economics. It is often generalized to suggest that independent
decisions taking into account only one’s self-interest leads to
the common good, a notion that is demonstrably false (e.g. the
Prisoner’s Dilemma
from Game Theory, and
Garrett Hardin’s article The
Tragedy of the Commons). Nonetheless, Smith’s
observation is appropriate and useful in limited contexts, but
it should not be turned into a religion, as is sometimes done by
Republican party to justify
greed.

abbreviation.Koch Owned Party
A more appropriate acronym for the current
Republican Party than
GOP, as it emphasizes that the
Republican Party no longer has an ideology other than
power for itself in service to its investors.

laissez-faire

n.
A doctrine opposing governmental interference in economic
affairs beyond the minimum necessary for the maintenance of
peace and property rights.

n.
A philosophy or practice characterized by a usually deliberate
abstention from direction or interference especially with
individual freedom of choice and action.

n.ORIGINAL:
One who is open-minded or not strict in the observance
of orthodox, traditional, or established forms or ways.

n.CURRENT:
One who seeks to maintain the changes of recent years or limit
the erosion thereof.

The dictionary definition of “liberal” has meaning
independent of the
political spectrum, but is now
almost exclusively used — incorrectly in my opinion
— as to mean someone from the left.
In the U.S. this means one of the two dominant parties of the
two-party system. The modern meaning of “liberal”
has therefore become simply a synonym for a
Democrat, i.e.
an artificial packaging of political views created to help
perpetrate the two party system.
As such, “liberal” has undergone an about-face
from someone who is open-minded and non-traditional to someone
who seeks to maintain the status quo in the face of efforts
to undo the program of past liberals. In addition,
the word “liberal” has acquired a negative
connotation due the sustained and withering attacks of
neo-conservatives.
Neo-conservatives use “liberal”
as a pejorative to tar their enemies as spend-thrifts of
government money, thus capitalizing on the meaning of the
English adjective form of the word. The effort to pejoratize
the word is also aided by the lack of defenders of the term
“liberal”; non-conservative political movements have
historically preferred to call themselves
“progressive”.
In the 18th and 19th century, “liberal” was
associated with disciples of John Locke (thus
the authors of the U.S. Constitution would have been liberals),
who believed in minimalist government (government as a protector
of rights, not an instrument of social policy).
The association of “liberal” with a more expansive
role for government may have begun with the New Deal, since by
then laissez-faire had become
orthodoxy that was failing under conditions much evolved from
those of Locke and the U.S. founders (the corporate age).

market system

n.
An economic system whereby decision making is distributed among
the market participants, each seeking to maximize his
return based on competition with the other market participants.

Market systems have always been regulated to some degree, as a truly
free market has never appealed to
those in power. Market systems have proved more efficient and
responsive to change than systems based upon centralized
decision-making.

meme

n.
an idea, behavior, style, or usage that reproduces and evolves
by spreading from person to person

This word was coined by
Richard Dawkins
to represent ideas that function in culture, society, and
history much as genes function in biological evolution. Just as
many competing genes may co-exist within in a species, and vary
in frequency within the population according to environmental
conditions, so do multiple memes exist and compete for dominance
in human society.

n.
1 a: traditional story of ostensibly historical events
that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or
explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon
2 a: popular belief, assumption or tradition that has grown up
around something or someone, especially one embodying the ideals
and institutions of a society or segment of society
2 b: an unfounded or false notion

These words are applied most often to the beliefs of ancient
societies, but they are very relevant to modern societies as
well. While sometimes the word is used to imply something
untrue, it is most useful in its more generic sense where no
comment on the truth or falsehood of the belief is implied.
Even when not implying falsehood, these terms may suggest that
the belief is arbitrary, rather the result of reason, or that
even if the concept is justifiable, that justification is not
the source of its belief. Such beliefs are not even recognized
explicitly; it would not occur to most to question whether they
are true or not, as alternative possibilities are not even
conceived. Thus the purpose of using this term to describe
modern belief is to point out beliefs or
memes that are taken for granted by their
society.

NIMBY movements are true grass roots
efforts of like-minded residents of an area who seek to maintain
the status quo (e.g. a healthy environment in which to live and
raise children) by opposing the development of nearby land
(especially for a polluting industry).
They could therefore be labelled
“conservative” by the
original meaning of the term, but in a sign of this Alice in
Wonderland world, increasingly their opposition comes from the
right, the supposedly “conservative”
end of the political spectrum,
as the right seeks to promote corporate rights (e.g. the right
to pollute and make money) over the rights of people (e.g. the
right to health). NIMBY movements are often attacked by
corporations with SLAPP suits. A frequent
criticism of NIMBY movements is that they don’t get the big
picture, which is true, but not in the way the industry means.
The industry means to threaten that if everyone opposed industry
in their backyard, there would be no industry. The truth is
that if everyone opposed pollution in their backyard, there
would be industry without pollution. NIMBY movements do however
miss the big picture in that they only oppose pollution in their
back yards, and not everywhere. NIMBY movements are also
criticized by industry for using pollution concerns as a screen
for their real concern about property values. This may be true
in a few cases. Still on the whole they are a very positive
force.

orwellian

adj.
Resembling the society described in Orwell’s novels
1984 or Animal Farm.

political spectrum

n.
An imaginary continuum of political thought ranging from the
right to the left.

An simplistic attempt, utterly without merit, to
simplify the multi-dimensional space of political
choices into a single dimension, so as to aggregate
political power from one cause to another by
encouraging a person like-minded on one issue to adopt
the other issues of a group. The ridiculousness of
one-dimensional characterization of political choice
is best seen when the adherents of the spectrum are
forced to assign widely divergent systems points on
the spectrum, such as when fascism and communism are
assigned to the “ultra-right” and
“ultra-left” respectively, when in fact
they have more in common with each other than they do
with the political thought assigned to nearby points
of the spectrum.

n.
gradual betterment; especially : the progressive development of mankind.

Progress is loosely defined, but there is a very strong need for
a metric so that the success of government and society can be
measured and the results used to guide future actions. In the
absence of accepted measures of progress, GDP is sometimes
substituted, but GDP is completely inappropriate for this
purpose, as it treats negatives as positives in its sum.

adj.
Making use of or interested in new ideas, findings, or opportunities.

n.
One believing in moderate political change and especially
social improvement by governmental action.

propaganda

n.
The spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of
helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person.

n.
Ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further
one’s cause or to damage an opposing cause. Also, a public
action having such an effect.

Propaganda is the primary method used by the powerful to control
the populace (both electorate and consumers). Propaganda
originates in many places (including the government, politicians,
corporations, public relations firms, and news organizations),
but increasingly comes from think tanks.
Propaganda products from think tanks (sometimes called “white
papers”) used to be primarily to influence those that the
public listens to, but is now often to be heard word for word
from the lips of news casters and politicians. Propaganda is
not necessarily false, but it is always one sided.

An alternative to winner-take-all
elections that gives representation to minority interests
in an elected body. It is unlikely to be adopted in the United
States because it would threaten the
two party system.

n.
The business of inducing the public to have understanding for
and goodwill toward a person, firm.

To the above “person, firm” should be added
countries, dictators, and ideas, as public relations firms are
increasingly paid to promote these as well. Public relation
firms are in business to make money, and promote what they are
paid to promote, often by questionable means.

adj.
Marked by a considerable departure from the usual or
traditional. Tending or disposed to make extreme changes in
existing views, habits, conditions, or institutions.
Advocating extreme measures to retain or restore a political
state of affairs.

“Radical” sometimes has a negative connotation
because the strength of conviction of many radicals has led some
to act outside of the law. However, radicals have often been at
the forefront of progress; one era’s radical becomes a later
era’s hero and their policies accepted as tradition.

ranked ballots

n.
A ballot where the voter ranks the choices in order of
preference. For example, the voter would label her first
choice with 1, her second choice with 2, etc.

Ranked ballots gather significantly more information from the
voters than common pick one of N choices ballots.
Coupled with a good algorithm for choosing the winners (e.g.
a Condorcet method), ranked ballots
minimize tactical voting and the
distortions that brings to elections. Ranked ballots are not
widely used in the U.S. and their adoption is difficult because
they would slightly weaken the
two-party system. There are many
methods for deciding the outcome of a ranked ballot election;
a popular one, but inferior to Condorcet methods, is
instant-runoff voting (IRV). IRV is still better than first past
the post voting, however.

religious right

n.
That faction of the right that advocates
a strict set of mores for the entire nation.

The term “religious right” is a double dissonance.
They are neither particularly religious in the true sense of the
word, as the things they advocate have less to do with theology
and faith than adherence to an arbitrary cultural norm, nor are they
particularly well aligned with the rest of the right. Religious
is not synonymous with demanding the conformance of
others to a strict set of mores. The religious right claims to
espouse Christian values, but their political agenda has more to
do with old testament values than new testament values. To be
successful at promoting their theology, religions do incorporate
cultural and societal norms into their teachings, a fact that
seems to confuse some in the religious right into thinking that
their mores should be universally followed. While aligned with
the right (alignment with one of the two parties being required by
the two party system), there is
significant tension between this faction and others of the
right, whose primary task is to serve corporations and the
rich.

republican party

n.
One of the two dominant political parties of the United States
dedicated to serving its investors by being in power. It
affects an ideology so as to attract the votes of a portion of
the electorate. Unrelated to the word “republic”.
The symbol of
the Republican Party is an elephant.

The coinages Republicrat and the analogous but less frequent
Demican are used to symbolize the
one-party nature of U.S. politics, when it comes to issues on
which the dominant parties of the
two-party system
agree. Such agreement (e.g. the 2003 invasion of Iraq) means
such issues are essentially relegated to the sidelines of public
discussion. In this view of things, Republicrats is then the
name of the single U.S. political party, and the
Republicans and
Democrats are seen as factions of
this one-party system, rather than as true independent
parties. Whether this is an appropriate angle to view
U.S. politics depends on the issue in question.

n.
In politics, using a randomly selected group to decide
political issues.

Instead of periodically electing representatives to
decide political issues, imagine randomly selecting
citizens to form a deliberative body (legislature,
assembly, etc.). This body might act for a period of
time, or limit itself to a single issue. By avoiding
professional politicians, sortition avoids the
the corrupting influence of money in seeking election
and re-election. It is often the case that polls show
ordinary citizens overwhelmingly in favor of some
policy that cannot make it past the legislature.
Sortition allows progress on such issues, similar to
initiatives. Whether it
would also suffer from the problems of direct
democracy is something that should be investigated,
and procedures designed to counter these problems
adopted (for example, a hybrid system where sortition
is used for one half a
bicameral legislature).

n.
A political argument for a position based on the tenth amendment
of the United States constitution.

“States rights” is a last-resort argument used by
all political camps when they are unable to win at the Federal
level and believe that they can win in at least some of the
states. Originally invoked primarily by
conservatives (original meaning) to
slow down the rate of change, it has increasingly been invoked
by liberals (new meaning) to slow the
rate of back sliding.

surveillance capitalism

n.
A new economic order that claims human experience
as free raw material for hidden commercial practices
of extraction, prediction, and sales.

The above definition is the first of eight given in
Shoshana Zuboff’s 2019 book to describe the new
business model and practices of companies such as
Google and Facebook. These practices have become
politically significant because their ability to
profile, target, and manipulate voters. They have
likely affected elections, including the 2016
U.S. Presidential election.

Many voting schemes are flawed in that voters who express their
true preferences are punished by having a low preference
outcome. For example, if you prefer candidate
A to B, and candidate
B to C, voting for
A may cause C to be elected.
The most common voting scheme in the U.S., first past the
post, has this property, as voters may only select one of
the choices on their ballot. In the example above, if
B and C are the candidates
most likely to be selected by other voters, voting for
A instead of B, may cause
C’s votes to exceed B’s,
thereby electing C and punishing the voter for
choosing her first preference. To vote tactically, the voter
first estimates the actions of all other voters, and then votes
in such the way that is most likely to give a better result than
other choices, given her estimate of other voters. In the above
example, she would vote for the lesser evil of the two
candidates most likely to be voted for by others. Such
voting schemes are terribly flawed, and yet almost every
U.S. election uses them, because they reinforce the
two-party system. The need for
tactical voting can be minimized by using more sophisticated
voting methods, such as ranked
ballots with Condorcet’s Method for
election resolution. While such systems are more complicated
for the election organizers, they are simpler for the voters,
who need only express their true preferences without regard to
what other voters will likely do.

terrorism

n.
the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion.

U.S. Army definition.
the calculated use of violence or the threat of violence to
attain political or religious ideological goals through
intimidation, coercion, or instilling fear.

The dictionary definition of “terrorism” has wider
applicability than common usage. Underground organizations are
labeled terrorist for the same acts that established powers such
as the United States routinely perform. As a result, the word
has lost its descriptive value, it is now simply a pejorative
(credit for this observation goes to Terry Anderson and Robert
Fisk, as reported in Fisk’s
Pity The Nation,
pages 435-436) or a dysphemism to make certain actions (e.g. the
killing of children) appear less offensive (cf. the killing of
terrorists). Before the word terrorist became popular,
bandit was sometimes used.

n.
An institute, corporation, or group organized for
interdisciplinary research (as in technological and social
problems).

two party system

n.
A political system the encourages power to be shared primarily
by members of two political parties and that works to exclude
other political parties from power.

The two-party system works by providing a system of voting that
punishes voters for supporting the choice that best
represents them, and rewards voters that support one of the two
dominant political power camps. Its purpose is to aggregate
power to a small group while giving the appearance of choice to
the electorate. Unlike a one-party system, the members of the
two dominant parties are willing to surrender political power
from time to time to the other party in return for the
appearance of legitimacy in the eyes of those over whom they
wield power. This yields a very stable system of government.
The political parties are themselves indirectly influenced by
their investors, which are often the same for the two parties.
The two party system is therefore a stable means for one class
to exercise indirect control over the government. Because their
access to power is indirect, the system permits government to
occasionally act contrary to the interests of the investors,
providing a safety valve that can effect changes strongly
supported by the electorate, thereby increasing the appearance of
legitimacy and providing additional stability. The two party
system reinforces the appearance of choice to the electorate
by promoting the concept of a
“political spectrum”
and rhetoric that positions the two parties at separate points
along this one-dimensional abstraction of political choice and
attempts to force most voters to characterize themselves by a
point on this spectrum, thereby aggrandizing power from one
issue to others.

welfare

n.
Nickname for the old Aid for Families with Dependent Children
(AFDC) program, now renamed Temporary Assistance to Needy
Families (TANF).

Welfare is a favorite target of Republicans, despite it being
one of the smaller components of the Federal budget (AFDC was
$26B in 1994, less than one tenth of the defense budget).
Targeting welfare is politically cheap and diverts attention for
other issues. Welfare is needs based, unlike corporate welfare.

winner-take-all

A competition where there is a single winner who reaps all (or almost
all) of the value competed for.

United States elections are most often winner-take-all
(e.g. president, governor, senator, representative, mayor,
…) in which the candidate with the most votes wins, and
all others lose. While this is fairly natural for executive
positions (e.g. president), it is only one possible choice for
elections of representatives to larger bodies (legislatures,
city councils, etc.). Elections to such bodies are made
winner-take-all by using single-member geographic districts, but
proportional representation
could be used instead with multi-member districts.
Winner-take-all is one of the pillars
of the two party system.
Note that even winner-take-all elections would benefit from
alternative election procedures, such as
approval voting or
Condorcet’s Method.

RECOMMENDED READING:The Winner-Take-All Society,
by Robert H. Frank and Philip J. Cook makes the case that
winner-take-all creates economic inefficiencies. It is not
particularly about politics, however.